Reckless Endangerment
by IrisMagic101
Summary: This story begins after Jane realizes that Billy has made a new friend that could very well take her place as Billy's sidekick. She finds the thought humbling since she can't seem to make him anything but miserable as of late. Assuming that its all her fault she tries to get the wheels in motion to guarantee a happier life for Billy at the risk of sacrificing her own. JANE AND BIL
1. Chapter 1

**I ADORE these two characters and the limitless possibilities with their very uncharted layers of years in the making of one of prime time's more interesting friendships. I hope that I can do their barely investigated pools of unspoken emotions a bit of justice with this story. Besides that, I'm writing this for my own sanity in my sudden irrational obsession with re-watching all the episodes, driving my loving and doting boyfriend CRAZY! Please, feel free to be warned that there will be a little bit/more like a lot a bit, of physical tension and most likely steamy scenes. I write long pieces and get a little long winded in my writing much like Jeremy does with his 'talking.' I hope you enjoy and PLEASE PLEASE (I'm not begging... Actually I am) REVIEW! **

Reckless Endangerment

By PlainJain988

Chapter One

I watched the second hand of the school clock ticking by with an impatience that I'd grown impossibly attached to. Even today, of all days, that I'd been given the unusual day off, I couldn't stop the nervous pitter patter of my sneaker smacking against the steel leg of my school desk. At the front of the class my brother was droning on about STD's, comparing them to the many parasites known to the human species; my favorite the pesky bed bug that is nearly undetectable unless witnessed by a trained eye. I shook my head as he gave me a nervous smile, a picture of a motel bed of a filthy motel pinned to the white board.

My brother should NOT be teaching Sex Ed, budget cuts or not. There had to be someone more suited for the task than him. He knew _how_ to get a girl in the back of his car in high school, not go over the meticulous list of consequences of what they were about to do before hand, check list and pen at the ready.

The school bell rang and instead of jumping up at the sound, ready to dart down the halls in full adrenaline force as usual, I forced myself to ease back into my chair, stretching my arms out in front of me. There was nowhere to be today.

My phone remained silent and still on the desk top. As Gray had promised, today was a recuperating day. She hadn't called or texted me since 11:59 on the dot, the night before. It was freeing, but at the same time the little that I had to do with my day, besides be the teenager that I begrudgingly little too often admitted to be, was all sort of imprisoning.

Watching my chitter-chattering peers pour out of the class before me, I realized with a heavy heart that I didn't expect… I didn't belong here anymore. What I had told Billy weeks ago, that I wasn't ready to leave being a teenager behind, was futile. I was already different. I had changed in the past few months, so much so that I would never be like any of these people again.

My face felt sad and hollow to me. Suddenly, all the direction my life had the day before just vanished. I was alone here. Even the one person I promised I wouldn't leave behind…

I grabbed my bag, making my way out of the class, giving a final wave to Ben, and headed out to the desolate hallways. These hallways meant a lot to these people. But they didn't hold the same currency for me anymore. I knew what was beyond them. To say that I was the only one in the school that knew that would be naïve and childish, if not completely vain, was a lie. There were kids here in much worse situations than me and Ben, who'd been working as soon as they had the ability with a working permit. Some people here had such hard lives and little money that the little they could make was what got food on the table for their brothers and sisters.

Reaching my locker, feeling emptier than ever, I managed to open it on one try. I stared at it with an open mouth, as if I'd just opened the Chamber of Secrets with the mere touch of my hand. When I was nothing but an awkward teenager, such things were another set of awkward stares, snickered jokes behind my back. Now… now I was more invisible than ever. No one noticed me. I spent so little time here, and the time that I did spend was in another realm of reality, with my head up in the clouds, heart soaring through a galaxy of dreams that were far above anyone else, I'd lost my identity. I was no longer the weird girl who hung out with the Convict's little brother with funny hair.

I sighed, running my hands across the fresh spines of my books inside the locker. They were so clean and trim that you'd think I'd never opened them. I glanced around, shyly now.

No one locked eyes with me.

Now… I was no one.

I dreaded lunch, with every intention of leaving campus and walking a mile or so up the street to the Twisty Cone for an Ice Cream Sundae to eat alone, and ventured into the designated area outside. It was like I was behind a one way piece of glass, watching the specimen without them knowing. No one did.

I used to get run into, if not completely run over by people. Instead they completely avoided me, as if I were an inanimate object, never moving. I had blended more into the background than I had been allowed to see before. Did these people even know me anymore? Did Billy?

Across the courtyard Zoe was sitting on the top of the table, Billy listening intently to one of her stories or something, with a goofy half cocked smile lingering on his lips as he squinted at the sun. I sighed, a smile gracing my face for the first time since I woke up. It filled me with a new sense of hope seeing him content and happy. And for that matter, I liked Zoe a great deal. She brought the uniqueness, the calm back into Billy's life. I was beyond grateful that she could do that for him. At one point in time I had been the one to calm the storms in Billy's life. So much had changed so fast, and being the amazing friend that he is, he tried like hell to keep up. For a great deal of time he was right beside me, chugging on like the freight train of a soul that he was.

You can't expect someone to do that forever though. I knew the time would come when we'd go in separate ways. To say that it didn't hurt a little, with all the optimism I felt for him, would be yet another lie to add to the lengthy lists of lies that I was building in my resume of suppressed emotions. I ducked my head and headed for the street, watching my back for the nonchalant security guards, who usually don't really do their job, to call me back.

Feeling a little gitty about ditching class, I made a little squeal and hammered my feet into the ground feeling the great need to pump my fists into the air 'jersey' style. I laughed at myself. It was nice to feel like a teenager for moment. It had been so long that doing things like this didn't feel like a lifeline, ready to let out at any moment. One wrong move and it was over.

The only sad part was that I had to do it alone.

I got back to school just in time for the warning bell to fire off, sending me off in a hasty rush, trying to balance my Styrofoam cup in my hands and not lose balance, which working for Gray seemed to really pay off well. After learning to scramble up and down steps with deliveries and beverage carriers for her various morning meetings, I seemed to have established the first good key to being a waitress; which was most likely going to be my next career if evil India ever got a sniff of the truth off of me. Her presence at the office terrified me. It could be the end of my career. Whatever career that was, lying constantly, never being my true self.

I got to my locker and stuffed a heaping spoon full of sprinkles in my mouth before chucking it into the trash bin across the hall. My peers were beginning to dissipate before me, lingering here and there as they attempted to head to their designated classes. I stilled at the trash can, watching them. For a moment… I just wanted it all back.

I turned around and jumped. Billy was leaning his back against my locker in his usual cool and collected stance: legs crossed at the ankles, stretched out before him with his arms locked over his chest. He had a playful but serious look on his face. Not a hint of a genuine smile that I used to get made an appearance that I becoming desperate to see. His stance in that moment was one of many that proved to me even more that my presence in his life only reminded him of the past that we could never reach again. One thing I said still stood true, I didn't want to do this without him. But perhaps, it was simply out of my hands at this point.

I was about to say hello as I approached him, feeling a little more at home with him being there, the other half of our inevitable duo throughout the years. I felt less like a zero with him around. He held up two fingers. "Two things," He spoke seriously, with a scowl on his face that only reminded me, without him even stating it, that I'd failed to tell him two important things about today. "One: You went to Curly Cone without me. That _really_ stings." He lowered his eyes, only dancing a little with enthusiasm with that fact. His jaw hardened and I felt the lightness in the air drop like weights onto the ground. I diverted my eyes. "Two: You didn't even tell me that you had the day off."

I shrugged. "I'm sorry?" I nudged next to him to get to my locker, his eyes watching me with an intense attention.

"Well… _This_ time, you're forgiven. Next time…" He mocked me, sliding his finger across his throat and the lump of his Adam's apple.

Unable to stop myself, I chuckled at his way with words, or severe lack of. When I looked up at him, he was giving me a smirk. It should have made me happy, but I knew his smiles like I knew the back of my own hand. There was a sadness behind it that would never set right with me. Instead, it threw me off; my smile, my mood and the impending sugar rush that was going to go unused. Just as this unstable friendly banter that served nothing to the other side but an obstruction of endless let downs.

I bowed my head. I couldn't look at him anymore. I shoved my books into my bag as Billy observed the slackers rushing through the hallways.

Shutting my locker I gave him a small smile. "I'm heading home now. I'll see you tomorrow, okay?"

He moved uncomfortably from foot to foot for a moment, his lips becoming a hard line across his face. Resituating his shoulder to set against the locker once again he gave a curt nod. "Right."

As I turned to head down the hallway, he called out to me. "Janey?"

I stilled but didn't turn around for a moment, contemplating the painfully familiar tone to his voice. He sounded like my best friend again. But these moments came in such small and unsatisfying spurts. Squeezing my eyes tight, I took a deep breath before turning around, plastering the ugliest sort of fake 'happy' Jane look on my face that I could muster.

His brows furrowed as he gave me his squinty concerned looks. "Are you okay?"

I smiled, and pursed my lips. Crossing the distance, I planted a kiss on his cheek and took his hand. At my touch, recognition made his mouth slack a little, his tongue rolling around in his mouth with thought until that sad smile crossed his lips, and then filled his eyes. That emotion hit me, hard, square in the chest.

"I'm here with you. That's what really matters. Remember?" I watched our hands, embracing as his fingers took life and melted into mine, weaving themselves between my fingers. He grasped them and with hesitation, leaned across the space between us, kissing me on the cheek.

I'd kissed his face a thousand times, it was my thing. Never, had he kissed mine. It was different, much different to feel his skin against mine in this way, his lips pressed up against the cool flesh of my cheek bone. I was what felt like ten degrees colder after my sundae. His affectionate smooch served as nothing to me but a bittersweet surrender. So this is what we were now. We were simply two people clinging onto a familiarity that was sweeping out from under our feet faster than we could latch onto.

Bittersweet; his kiss, his hands, his words, his half attempted smile. The entire situation seemed so cost inefficient.

I thanked god for Zoe in that instant. She would bring the old Billy back to life when I was gone. That was what mattered most to me. Watching his eyes, slipping back and forth as he gazed into mine, I realized how much more important his happiness was than mine. I gave his hand a squeeze relishing in the fact that once I was on my way home, he'd fall back into his new routine and happiness would step back in. I released him, on more terms that I was sure he was aware of. Looking around at the walls, that no longer confined me as a child rather than serving as reminders of a past I no longer lived in, I gave a smile of a child saying goodbye to a long loved and dear old friend.

"You're going to be late for fifth period." I smiled. He didn't budge, just kept watching me with the unnerving hesitation that made me think he noticed more about my inner workings than I let myself believe. It frightened me, but I kept up the act for the mere fact that I could possibly be as good at lying to my best friend as I was at balancing iced mocha's and spreadsheets. I needed him to believe that long list of lies; they intertwined with the essence of who I was now.

Giving me a nod, he shoved off the locker. "I'll come by after school. We can hang out for a while. Maybe watch a movie, get some Thai?"

There was a pleading look in his eye that made me waver. "Seriously. Get to class, your still on High School time."

He smiled a real smile. There was only a hint of something dark beyond it that I couldn't correctly gauge. "Only if you say yes."

The fear of our night in scared me in more ways than one that I wasn't willing to think about or consider. Knowing I had no way out of it, I did the only thing that I could think of that would keep the night in tact without coming apart at the seams.

"Okay." I agreed. "Ask Zoe to come. She can pick the movie!"

He stopped mid-backwards stride, the smile slipping off his face. "Zoe?"

"Yeah!" I said re-situating my bag onto my shoulder. "I really would like the get to know the girl that lights up your face lately. She seems very…Cooool." I wondered for a moment, trying to pin point the reason I seemed to like her so much and then it hit me, making me smile even more. These two were two peas in a pod. "She's very _you_. This one, if wanted, could be some serious girlfriend potential."

He shook his head, for some reason aggravated by something that I said. "I'll see you after school, Jane."

**Did you like? Please TELL me. :) Hugs to all you Billy and Jane shippers. Second Chapter is already ready for submission. If you like it...I post more. **


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter Two: Forgive Me…Not

Much to my delight he did end up asking Zoe to swing by and watch a movie with us. What I'd told him at school in the hallway was true. I really wanted to get to know her. She seemed to bring a side of him out that both excited and paralyzed me because I couldn't be the everything that he needed. It didn't sit right with me, as it wouldn't sit right with anyone who'd been more or less stitched to another persons side for as long as they could remember. But the two sat down when Zoe finally showed after a fifteen minutes of Billy and me shuffling through the DVD's on the floor. She was talking with him softly as I watched them from the kitchen counter, popcorn puffing away in pops and spasms in the microwave. I crossed my arms over my chest, watching her take his hand, seemingly reading it.

Ben strolled in, in his slippers, pulling a beer from the fridge. He leaned next to me on the counter, Billy and Zoe completely oblivious to the attention their connection was gaining.

I stifled a laugh and leaned into my brother, not taking my eyes off of Zoe cradling Billy's hand as he gave her that pinched eye look that he gave me when he thought I was being funny, but didn't have the heart to tell me I was a dork to my face. "Is she _reading_ his palms?"

He gave a nod, unscrewing the cap of his beer, taking a quick swig, "The oldest trick in the book. It's like they suck you in from the mere touch of holding their hand. But you're not quite sure if they are just really friendly and affectionate… or if they want to just get into your pants. Usually the later is what we boys are hoping for."

Simultaneously the microwave shut off with a high pitch beep as my hand flew up between us. "Too many conversations about my families _all to _personal affairs in one day." I opened the door to the microwave and poured its contents in the bowl beside it, a bright lollipop red. I felt my face scrunch up as I realized what I was probably kicking into motion with Billy and Zoe. The second I gave my blessing they may be all over each other just and Lulu and he were.

Running a hand through my hair, I placed a hand on Ben's back as he padded down the hallway to his bedroom again, shoving him away. He chuckled as the door shut behind him.

Zoe had her feet tucked under her, dressed in a pair of cute black skinny jeans and a Rolling Stones T-shirt. I gave her and him a smile as I placed the bowl on the table. She flopped on the couch next to him, grabbing the bowl and placing it in her lap.

"So, did you find a movie to watch?" I asked her.

She shrugged. "I'm more of a slasher/horror lover myself."

I rolled my eyes. "Of course. Billy too." I grabbed a black crate of DVD's that were packed away in the entertainment center, handing them to her before sitting down in Ben's usual chair. "I'm such a wuss when it comes to those movies. I enjoy them, sure. But they give me nightmares. I'd rather not. You know?"

She shuffled through them, her eyes opening wide at Steven King's Pet Sematary. Before I could help it, I was cringing. Something I didn't tell many people was that after my father died, seeing death was no easy chore me, real or fake. The second a scene scrolled across the screen between father and daughter, I felt my insides doing their painful dance, struggling to make ends meet with the various wounds I'd gathered from losing my father. I didn't know if they'd ever heal, or rather be a badly stitched seam, ready to burst at any moment for any reason, because as my wounds… They had the right to bleed.

I looked up, Zoe flipping the copy over in her hands. "I haven't seen this in forever! It's a classic." Glancing up at Billy, she gave him her rebellious eye. "What do you say convict, shall we?"

He smiled down at her, but then gave me an all knowing glance, beginning to shake his head. He knew better. He'd known me before Dad died when we'd try and sneak in slasher movies without him knowing, thrilled by the possibility of fear and adrenaline.

Billy also knew me after, when I saw my father's body in a glossy wooden box, leaving nothing but shattered pieces of myself all over the ugly maroon carpet.

He opened his mouth to speak, but I interrupted.

"Of course! It's a classic, like Zoe said. It's a must!" I bounced excitedly.

Zoe and Billy laughed together over the various parts I had to look away, and then both left the house together with nothing but a wave. I watched him wrap his arm around her shoulder. I caught myself swallowing a cotton ball like lump in my throat.

Two things I'd gathered that night:

First thing: I hate evil babies back from the dead.

Second Thing: Three's a crowd.

I entered my room that night, hesitating before lifting the bed skirt and searching the underneath before getting ready for bed. And thanks to the whole night… Now I was going to have nightmares. The things you do for the ones you love…

I dreamed a strange dream that night. I was sitting in a dark room, a spotlight shining over me, the darkness so thick I couldn't make a shape out of it. Was it an entrance into the never ending abyss of my mind, my future? I looked around, first sitting on the floor in a pair of grubby jegging's that I hadn't seen in months and a tie die t-shirt I couldn't remember wearing since I was seven, when my Uncle Tom from Virginia showed Billy and I how to tie-die them ourselves. I had at least a dozen of them. I didn't know where they'd gone over the years.

Suddenly, I heard movement from the corner, a shuffling of feet. Out of the darkness Billy stood, his features dark and menacing in a way that I'd never seen them before. He kept saying something, dressed in his red skinny jeans and leather jacket, hair styled in his classic Mohawk. I may have smiled if I wasn't so lost, so scared of what was 'out there' where I couldn't see, where I was afraid to go. He held out his hand to me. At first I stood without a second thought, ready to grasp the hand of the two people I trusted and cared for most in this world, knowing that no matter what that he'd keep me safe from harm.

Billy would always protect me.

His eyes slimmed against the hollow darkness beneath his lids, the darkness behind him creeping around him like tendrils of hair. He was still speaking, but I couldn't make out the words, couldn't try to read his lips in the darkness.

"Billy…" I tried to pull him into the sanctuary of my bright spot, to save him from the terrifying darkness, which was beginning to fill my safe sphere with a steam, less like a fog or mist.

It felt like something inside was on fire. I was too afraid to leave the light. In the darkness, Billy stayed. Our hands were intertwined, half eclipsed in darkness and the other half radiating in the safety of the light. His hand was unordinary hot to the touch. What if he was getting sick out there in the darkness? I had to help him, bring him back to the light.

"Billy, I can't hear you." I whispered, tears running down my face as his hand grew unbearable to hold in mine. I felt an itching in my throat, a fire rupturing through my veins, rushing into my heart with a painful cramping. I thought of my father's heart attack, the fatal heart disease that ran in the family.

I gazed into Billy's menacing eyes, his lips still moving in the same rhythm.

"It's was _you_, Janey." He finally said. He stepped into the light without my force and dropped my hand, standing only inches away from my face. "It was always you. You destroy everything."

He looked towards the darkness. "Out there, my world is going up in smoke." Then his angry eyes pierced back into mine, his hand lurching out to grasp the fabric where my heart laid beneath it. He ripped me out of the light, my lungs filling up with smoke as fire exploded around us in a tight circle, our bodies crushed against each other, his hot breath on my face. I shook with a fear that I'd never felt in Billy's arms. I struggled to break free. Out here, in the darkness where I could see nothing but destruction around us, Billy wasn't as safe. Out here…He could hurt me.

"Wake up, Janey." He said to me, his tone less harsh. His hand slipped onto my cheek, gentle and soothing. I looked to him so hurt, so terrified. "Jane, you're going to be late for school."

I shot up in bed, my heart pounding in my chest, gasping for air. The second the fresh air of my bedroom sunk into my lungs I let out a desperate cry. The sun was basking the sheets around me, which were disgusting, absolutely soaked in my own sweat. I put my hand against my forehead, which was pounding intensely just above my brow. I was physically dripping in sweat.

A groan came from the floor, and I took notice to the grey and worn converse sneaker propped up on the side of the bed. I followed the length of the leg attached to it, dressed in skinny black jeans, down to the industrial belt buckle, the trim strip of skin exposed below a loose fitting black t-shirt, to Billy's pain stricken face covered with his hands, red liquid running down, just below his cheek bone.

It all fell together and I was instantly falling to the ground next to him with a wad of tissues crunched up in my hand, fretting over the bloody nose he'd gotten when he'd tried to wake me up. He barely opened his eyes as I moved his hands away to put pressure against his draining nose.

"Oh my God, Billy! I'm so so so sorry!" I cried.

I helped him sit up, his legs outstretched in front of him. Titling his head up, he took a hold of the tissue against his nose, already getting soaked in his blood. I started ripping more from the box when he grabbed my arm. Trying to keep his nose tilted, which for some reason, though I was ripping myself apart inside for hitting him, it was amusing. He let go of my arm as he got my attention, and reached out to my forehead, touching his fingers to the pulsing bump on my head. His finger glided to my hairline.

"Jane. I think you're sick." He fell back onto his elbows, the blood trickling through the tissue paper, so I handed him the new wad. He took them from my hand, tears welling up in the back of his eyes, misting over them in a foggy manner. He started to stuff the tissue into his nostrils, making his voice muffled and altered "And by the way… I never realized how literal I was being when I told you you were hard headed for all these years. Your head…It's _really_ hard."

"I'm so sorry Billy. I was just having a terrible-terrible dream." I started, the dream leaking back into my conscious state of mind. I crushed my eyelids shut as the fear crippled me. Billy and me in darkness.

He groaned. "See! That's why I knew it was a bad idea for Zoe to pick the movie. And I was going to tell her no. But you had to go and act all mother-hen slash matchmaker on me and insist on bonding time."

My temper flared, partially because I was drenched in my own sweat and because he was treating me like the bad guy when I was sacrificing our time together for better means of making him happy. I was beyond drawn from the entire situation. "I like Zoe. You don't tell me anything about her and you don't bring her around. I just want to get to know her better. She makes you so… so much better than you were a few weeks ago. You actually _laugh_ now, Billy! Don't you understand how important that is to me?"

He shot up, his furious face, stuffed with an outrageous amount of blood spattered tissues, only inches away from my own, his green eyes blazing with the same irritation I'd seen the day before. "Maybe if you were a better friend you wouldn't have to sacrifice a good night's sleep just to entertain my other friends. Maybe if you weren't so hard headed…"

A smile crept up onto my face. With every word the free tissue, still free of the weight on his nasal discharge was flapping on the currents of his every exhale. We stared at one another for a moment, trying to keep up the tension, but it broke as we both flew into a fit of giggles. He fell back onto the floor, his stomach contracting with every painful laugh that shook his entire body.

"This is ridiculous." I managed to get out, holding my hand against my cramping stomach.

His eyes squinted at me. "Is this laugh real enough for you Jane?"

I slapped his leg playfully. "It'll do." I said as I stuffed the side of my face into my shoulder. This usual shy tactic of mine brought an admiring smile to his lips and I felt better than I had when I woke up. He grabbed my arm and yanked me down onto the floor next to him, covering my forehead with his hand, feeling the pulsing bump already starting to grow on the surface.

He chuckled. "That sucker is going to be HUGE!"

"Not as big as your nose." I muffled into his shoulder. I could almost hear the smile in his laugh as he mused with my hair and cradled me into his side, letting out a deep sigh.

All I could think was, _much_ better. I could live in that moment forever. Nothing felt more secure, more peaceful than laying next to Billy, snuggled up into his side, his jaw resting on top of my head. I put my hand on his chest, feeling its soft swell and fall. His hand cupped mine on top of his chest. "I miss you, Janey." He whispered. I laced his fingers into mine and snuggled into his chest.

Then my bedroom door swung open. Ben took in the two of us on the floor and then puzzlement followed fury. "Did you two just _hit_ each other?"

We burst out into fits of laughter, leaving Ben with his hands in the air, turning around and stomping away, glancing over his shoulder in confusion. On his way out, he made it clear that he left the door wide open, putting one of my heels from the floor in front of it. Billy swallowed hard against the top of my head and unlaced his fingers from mine, giving me a smile and picked himself off the floor.

I wished that was how we remained, like we used to be. But over the next week Billy and I talked less and less. He spent the majority of his time with Zoe and the remainder of that time was spent making conversations with me as minimal as possible. The wall between us that I had presumed came crumbling down that day took no time to reconstruct itself. Ben started to take responsibility in getting me to work and back during our lunch period and Billy barely showed his face around the house anymore. Every day that passed and he didn't call or didn't show up out of the blue like normal, I felt my heart weigh down heavier in my chest. I thought that if I had welcomed Zoe into our little pow wows, he'd just bring her around and we could all co-exist. It turned out that in the end, she simply replaced me.

Over the years of being friends with Billy, going through losses and withstanding the consequences of pain and scars with the support of one another to keep us sane, I thought that we had established a more solid relationship. I didn't really _think_ that I replaceable. To say that I didn't intend for it to happen, would have been a lie I didn't want to constitute to my lie bank. It was the cold hard facts of the evolution of a childhood friendship and lying to myself about it would only make it harder to accept.

I watched Billy walk away from me in the hallway at school Monday morning, only giving me a one armed hug and wishing me luck at work when he saw Zoe at the other end of the hall walking towards us. He said, "Catch you later," and strolled off to her, grabbing her hand in his and walking away as she gave me a sad smile and a small wave.

Ben popped his head out of his office and grimaced at me, "Jane, I'm not going to be able to give you a ride today. I forgot about a meeting that I have with the coach to go over the next games details." He squinted down the hallways, seeing Zoe and Billy stopping at her locker. "Do you think Billy will be able to give you a ride or let you borrow the car _just_ this once?"

I stomped my foot. I did not want to trouble Billy, especially now when things between us were so…distant. "Ben! C'mon, it takes like literally ten minutes to get to the train."

"I'm sorry Jane, I just can't today. There's a game tonight to, so I won't be able to pick you up, either." He went back into his office and shut the door, Coach sitting in the seat on the other side of his desk, throwing a baseball up in the air a few times before standing up and hovering over Ben with his hands on his hips. Ben swallowed and shrunk into his chair, nodding and smiling uncomfortably, only glancing through the window long enough to mouth, "Sorry," until panic flourished in his eyes when Coach gave me a warning look and shut the blind.

Shouting erupted from the space beneath the door and everyone turned in its direction. I gave a shy smile and bowed my head. Instead of heading towards the back towards Ben's car, I had to take the front doors, already deciding to not ask Billy for his help and just catch the bus. Looking at my watch, I cursed under my breath, knowing there was no time to change before work this time and rushed to my locker, fumbling with the lock a few times before it popped open. I shoved my school stuff inside, planning to just catch the bus back later and pick it up after hours. Just as I was about to slam the door shut, _everything_ inside the locker came tumbling out, a heavy English Literature book landing square on the center of my foot, the plain ballet flats on my feet protecting _nothing._

Hopping on one foot and looking like the world's finest human example of a flamingo, I slammed everything back into my locker with all the force I was feeling from how terrible everything was going that day. For one thing, not a _single_ person had remembered my birthday. I was eighteen today, a particularly pivoting point in any girl's life, and no one remembered. I didn't get any, not even one, "Hey Jane! Happy Birthday!"

Usually I would just pout and walk around long faced all day. Today, I'd already decided I was plain old, no way around it, _pissed_.

Of course, because that was how my day was going, the door to the locker wouldn't shut.

I was shoving and shoving and shoving with all my body weight, but it remained stubborn to my every tactic. I growled, a menacing, 'get the hell out of my way,' growl and felt the smoke of my fury building up so strong inside of me that I let it spiral out through my core, into my fists.

"Just shut, you son of a-." I slammed my fists, a painful slap, against the door. The stinging radiated like fire through the sides of my fists, into my fingertips, gunning down the length of my arms. Through all the pain, I was deeply satisfied by the fact that the door locked into place.

I knew everyone was looking at me, the crazy awkward girl that just threw a criminally insane hissy fit on her locker. But I just didn't care, or rather, have time to care. Either option was a good defense. I sprinted towards the front doors with my bus pass in my purse, planner in my hand, running as fast as my legs could take me. The bus was going to leave any minute.

"Shoot…Shoot…Shoot." I panted.

I whizzed past Zoe and Billy, completely aware of Billy watching me with confusion and panic. Soon I heard a pair of feet racing behind me as I burst through the front doors.

"Jane!" He called after me. He caught up with me faster than I expected, just as I was about to cross the intersection. Grabbing my arm fiercely, he yanked me back.

I ripped out of his hold and spat, "I don't have time Billy! What?"

He was panting. "What are you doing? Trying to catch the bus?"

"Yes! What do you want? Precious moments are ticking away here!"

He gave me a square look and stood up straight. "Trying to catch up with you!" He yelled. Putting his fist to his mouth, trying to suppress an anger with me that I didn't understand, Billy actually _yelled_ at me. "Which is what I'm always doing with you! God! I'm trying to give you a ride but your acting like a _lunatic_! _This_ is exactly why it's so hard to be your friend sometimes! You're so caught up in everything else that you don't even see me standing right in front of you…"

I _did_ see him standing in front of me. I saw him as he really was…unhappy. He was chained to me and it wasn't fair. He deserved to live his own life without feeling like he had to pick up my slack and save me from a world that I really needed to learn how to handle all on my own. I wasn't going to be the reason that his relationships didn't work out anymore. I didn't want to be the stick in the mud that he kept trying to yank out. I just wanted Billy to be happy. He wasn't happy anymore and it was my entire fault. Why wouldn't he just walk away and leave me to rot? I deserved it. For being the world's worst friend to the worlds equally as loyal person I'd ever known to exist.

I hated myself for ruining him.

I shut my eyes, adrenaline pumping through my veins, my hands burning from slamming my fists into my locker, my stomach spinning from being so upset with no real release.

"Whatever," was all I could get out, after turning my back to him, getting ready to cross the street again.

I was so fed up, so tired and so worn thin. I didn't get much sleep anymore, the hours on my clock during the night vivid in my memory every morning that I woke up. My legs were so sore, so restless every second of the day. I put the back of my hand up to my forehead, feeling it all sink in before I had the chance to take it back.

I was just _so_ tired. I was too young to be running around like this, too immature to actually synchronize my two lives with affective organization. The world was spinning around me in sickening circles. I heard Billy turn around in defeat, heading back to school, when the sky came crashing down on me. Tears exploded against my eyes, fits of breathless sobs long suppressed rushing up my esophagus.

My shoulders started to tremble as all the strength I'd been forcing into my legs, just gave out.

I dropped to my knees and cried like a little girl in the first grade. I cried like I had the day that I watched my father get lowered into the ground and rocked back and forth just as I did the night that I realized my mother was never coming back, that she didn't love me enough to stick around.

Billy came back, as he always did, which made me cry even harder. He knelt in front of me, his hands taking mine as he tried to look me in the eyes, "Janey? What's wrong? Talk to me, Jane."

I couldn't make any words worth understanding come to life. All that was washing around in a spin cycle in my head was that I was going to be late. The bus took at least an hour to get to the train and I'd be lucky if I could catch it.

It was all over, my life, my friendship with Billy as I knew it, and the dream that I had worked so hard and risked so much to create.

I collapsed into myself. This was all too much for a puny teenage girl to handle all by herself. I was a pathetic excuse of a person, not strong enough, not wise enough, and not old enough. I wasn't enough of anything to _do_ anything right. I was an absolute failure.

Not being able to watch me in tears any longer he wedged his shoulder into the crease of my stomach and lifted me off the ground, hanging over his back as the tears rushed back over my eyes and dropped like light rain over the sidewalk, tangling with my lashes and hair. My was entire body weak and guideless, flopping against the length of Billy's back as he carried me.

I heard the door of the Beast swing open on rusty hinges as Billy set me in the backseat. He leaned in close me, his face a blurry image behind all my tears. I was hiccupping like crazy, unable to barely get a real breath of air. Kneeling in front of me, he put his hands together in a prayer formation, rubbing them together before he touched the tips of his fingers to his lips.

"Janey, I love you." My hiccups ceased; my heart stopping in my chest. "Because I love you, I will not let you fall apart right now." I let out a breath of relief that seemed to sting him for a second before it seemed like just a figment of my imagination and he gave me a four-star smile. "So…do whatever you have to and clean yourself up and get ready to show Grey and India what your made of."

"Steel," I smiled bleakly through my tears. "Brains of steel."

"Cause we know you can't throw a punch." He chuckled. Tapping me on the knee, he stood up allowing me to swing my feet into the car. "Stop crying already, you know I can't handle it." It was barely a conservation, much like all the other conversations we had. He always cut it short these days, sweet and to the point.

Jumping in the front seat, he started the engine and looked into the rear view mirror for a moment. I caught his eyes, so distant and sad that I nearly cried all over again. But my best friend just picked the pieces of me off the floor and though we were going through something vicious and probably devastating to what we had always been, I was glad that right then and there, he was there for me.

A feeling of impending doom was surrounding me as we rode to the train station in an unusual silence. I knew, as I walked away from Billy at the station, that he wouldn't always be there for me. The second I sat down again, far away from Billy, from my old life, tears started crushing me all over again. Knowing that it was because of him broke my heart into a thousand sharp and dangerous pieces that I had no intention of trying to pick up. I brought a shaking hand to my trembling lips, trying to go unnoticed by everyone else around me. Those sharp pieces of my old self would remind me why you don't get close to anyone. Sooner or later… They just end up leaving you.

I let my face fall into my hands, whispering for myself to hear, "Worst birthday…ever."

**Just wanted to say thank you to everyone who left a review and made my day by adding me to their alerts! I didn't expect such a turn out. Thank you so much! I hope you enjoyed this chapter. Let me know what you think about Jane's current sad sense of denial! Billy breaks my own heart writing this... :( Review review review. I love to hear you thoughts! **


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